Discretization of electromagnetic problems

Level: Late undergraduate, graduate. Background in linear algebra and
some familiarity with variational methods is assumed. No advanced notions of
functional analysis (such as Sobolev spaces, etc.) are required.

What's in the course:

The main idea, which goes much beyond electromagnetics, is this: Many partial
differential equations are just the local expression of some set of
integral laws, that expresses the conservation of something. Hence,
physical laws can be formulated as equalities between various kinds of
integrals, such as line integrals, surface integrals, etc., and their time
derivatives.

Now, if one is content with enforcing these conservation laws, not on
all
lines, surfaces, etc., but only on those generated by a discretization mesh,
what
one gets is a numerical scheme, naturally endowed with the desirable
conservation properties. Something is lost, of course, in the process:
Constitutive laws, as a rule, will not be satisfied exactly: this is
where
the discretization error lies, and the central problem with approximation
methods.

A somewhat surprising but, as will be argued, logical consequence of holding
this viewpoint, is that finite elements are not, primarily, "interpolants", that
generate fields from degrees of freedom. We rather see them, here, as a device
to produce approximations of lines, surfaces, etc., by mesh-related polygons,
polyhedra, etc. Hence linear operators, the nature of which will be made
precise
in this course, whose adjoints, known as "Whitney forms", generalize
standard finite elements in a useful way. How useful is demonstrated by
example applications such as electrostatics and magnetostatics, whose
mathematical structure can be found, identical up to mere changes of symbols, in
many other branches of applied science.

Here follows the Table of Contents. Click on the appropriate button to download
a .ps or .pdf version for each of the four Chapters and the reference list.
The .ps
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(Both
versions are formatted alike, and run over 67 A4 pages.)